


The Girl Who Escaped into Space and Time

by toasty_keeg



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Adventure, Alien Planet, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Exploring the TARDIS, Fluff, Original Character(s), Outer Space, Post Amy Pond & Rory Williams, References to Norse Religion & Lore, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-07
Updated: 2020-10-03
Packaged: 2021-02-28 23:14:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 15,341
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23045371
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/toasty_keeg/pseuds/toasty_keeg
Summary: An insomniac watching the snow late at night meets a blue box and an accompanying stranger. She's itching to get out of her claustrophobic town, but just didn't think it would go down like this.
Comments: 3
Kudos: 9





	1. A Strange Box in the Snow

There is something about the season of winter that goes hand-in-hand with isolation. Sometimes it’s seasonal affective disorder, sometimes it’s being snowed in at home while others are staying warm together. Other times, it’s the cold, the unrelenting chill that bites down at one’s bones, bringing hands into coat pockets and puffs of air from chapped lips.

For Sarah, it was hard to describe. Winter brought forth a feeling in her that made sleep difficult, that tugged wistful thoughts from her mind. While her family slumbered upstairs at this late hour, she was wrapped in blankets in her cold basement bedroom, watching the snowflakes slowly dance their way to the ground. It wasn’t ideal here, with her dismissive, disapproving family, the isolated location of her home, and being an achingly slow six months away from graduating and moving out for good, but at least tonight was pretty.

The moon was out, just enough of it to be seen while obscured by clouds, its light bouncing off the snow onto the ground. A thin layer dusted the naked branches of the two trees in the front yard, clinging to them like lace, only to be disturbed by an unexpected wind and…wait.

It didn’t _sound_ like wind. Sarah heard it through the window, a wheezing, grating sort of whooshing sound that she’d never heard before. She’d never heard anything even _remotely_ like it before. Her eyebrows knotted together in confusion as she squinted outside, just noticing then how the air out there was distorted. It was like the air, transparent as it may have been, was moving in waves, slowly generating a shape from within itself.

The light was the first part she saw. It stood at the very top of the shape, shining like a beacon in the night as it materialized into her world. In and out like a slowly flickering light, an object came to be in Sarah’s front yard, a big blue box with glowing windows at the top and a sign that felt misleading to say the least. When it finally stood still and seemed solid, the words above its windows were legible, and they didn’t seem quite right.

“Police Public Call Box?” she muttered to herself, reading and rereading the words. There weren’t any of those in Canada; even pay-phone booths were becoming scarce. She leaned closer to the window to get a better look at the thing, only to duck and hide out of sight when she saw the door open. It was just a crack, but she hid nonetheless, not knowing who or what was in there. Maybe it was some horrendous beast that knew it had been seen, and was rushing toward the window with sharp claws and a hungry, snarling mouth filled with bloodthirsty teeth—

That couldn’t have been right. There was no disturbance outside, and when it felt safe to check, Sarah slowly poked her head up to see what was out there. The box remained, silent and still, and the stranger was gone, with no evidence of its presence save for footprints in the snow. From the appearance of it, the stranger had walked across the lawn, crossed the street, and stepped into the small cluster of trees and bushes that lay on the other side.

A thought crossed her mind, only becoming more and more inescapable the more she considered it. The strange box was still out there, unguarded, and Sarah was very curious. Two options were laid out before her, to see what it was or to leave it be and move on, and one of those options was out of the question.

Her family upstairs was sound asleep but nonetheless Sarah took care to be silent as she got out of bed and dressed herself. It was far too cold to go out in pajama pants, so she clambered into leggings and tugged a simple, knee-length black dress over them, wrapping herself up in a black knit cardigan and pulling dark gray woolen socks up her legs. Warmth and comfort were both equally important, especially during this time of the year. Having gotten dressed, she slowly stepped out from her bedroom, careful at even the tiniest creak from the hardwood floors beneath her feet. The basement was dark around her, but she was used to it and knew its layout. Sarah could have walked all the way to the door with her eyes closed and not bumped into anything; she knew it that well. Her winter coat and boots waited next to the doorframe and she donned them quickly, fingers fumbling at the boot laces, as if her hands could not keep up with the demands of her mind.

It was cold outside but she didn’t pay attention, striding through the snow even when it wormed its way into her boots. She hoped and crossed her fingers that snowdrifts would cover her footprints, that was, if Mother Nature was on her sneaky, adventurous side. Around the driveway she walked, skirting the side of the house and making her way into the front yard where the strange box stood. The door was open just a crack, the light from the inside beckoning her. One hand on the handle, she pushed the blue, wooden door open, and almost fell to the floor when she saw what was inside.

“What?” Sarah whispered to herself.

It was massive inside, massive in a way that no phone booth could possibly be. Where there should have been wooden walls painted blue was an enormous room, its structure odd and alien and tinted in warm colors. Sets of stairways led up, down, and around the place, and its center was populated by a cylinder of glass and metal, surrounded by a control panel of sorts. Circular indentations decorated the walls in a simple, vertical pattern, the entire room itself complicated and whimsical at the same time.

The strangeness and nearly paradoxical nature of the room pulled her inside, mind questioning everything she was experiencing, with one hand on the railing to steady her shaking form. The floor below her was a fusion of metal and glass, segmented into geometrical shapes in a design unlike any other. Sarah felt a tinge of guilt as her boots tracked snow into the box and onto its clean floors. She was breaking and entering, there was evidence that she was there, but she nevertheless continued to explore.

How was this even _possible_? It couldn’t be. She’d failed physics a year ago, yes, but she knew enough to understand that boxes didn’t work this way at all. Things weren’t bigger on the inside, they just _weren’t_.

The console at the center of the room almost seemed to beckon her, catching her eye with its confusing myriad of levers and blinking buttons. It was like an alien had tried to redesign the dash of a car, having only seen it in a fleeting dream, and applied a lot of imagination to its creation. Several pieces looked out of place, almost none of the instruments seemed to match one another, and there was an actual _bell_ in one spot, the type that would be found on a concierge’s desk.

“Oh, hello there. I hadn’t expected any visitors.”

Sarah’s blood turned cold at the stranger’s voice behind her. She was caught, she didn’t think the stranger would be back so soon, she was _caught_. Her fingers felt numb and tingly in fear, but she turned nevertheless to face the speaker behind her.

It wasn’t a bloodthirsty monster, or even a green, bug-eyed alien, but rather a man. A taller man, dressed like a college professor with a quirky sense of style. He wore a light brown, tweed jacket over a button-down dress shirt, topped off with a red bow tie, black slacks on his legs and brown, leather boots. His hair was the color of a tree trunk, flopped over his forehead, and although he had just caught a complete stranger intruding, his expression was a kind one, showing no hostility or anger.

“I…I’m sorry,” Sarah stammered. “It just appeared outside and I was curious and…what even _is_ this place?” Her hands flailed about as she spoke, their movements accentuating her words. “It’s a phone booth, but phone booths are tiny…Where are we? How are we even here? Who are you?”

The stranger laughed to himself, a brief, light sort of sound. He took a few steps forward, gently setting a mysterious object onto the floor as he did so. “This here, this is the TARDIS! Bigger on the inside, kind of impossible right?”

“Kind of?” He was used to it, he was perfectly at ease with it. Of course he was, he’d just walked out of the thing. He had a name for it and all, and the longer she stood there, taking everything in, the more at ease she became with it as well. “Yeah, yeah it is.” Seeing as it had literally just _appeared_ out of nowhere, the strange interior wasn’t that shocking when she thought about it. “You didn’t answer my question, though. Who are you?”

“Oh, right. Yes. Sorry. I’m the Doctor.”

“Doctor who?”

“Ah, can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard that one. It’s just the Doctor.”

“Huh.” With everything that was around them, with what had just happened, the unconventional nature of his name seemed perfectly normal. Sarah just might have been shocked if it turned out to be something mundane like Bill or Fred, but no, it was the Doctor. “Well, it’s nice to meet you, Doctor.” She stuck a hand out to him, ready to shake. “I’m Sarah.”

The Doctor eyed her outstretched hand, almost questioning, before shaking it with his own. “Sarah…who?”

She laughed, baffled and a bit amused. “Sarah Ride.”

“Sarah Ride, eh? Like the astronaut, Sally Ride?”

“I guess? I don’t know; I mean, I sometimes wonder but—”

“Do you want to meet her?”

“What?”

“You heard me; would you like to meet Sally Ride?”

She _had_ heard him, it just wasn’t the sort of question that one could expect. “Isn’t she dead though? Died a couple years ago and stuff?”

“Sarah, do you know where we are? Do you know what you’re standing inside of?”

“Didn’t you say, you said it was called the…the TRADIS?”

“TARDIS,” the Doctor corrected quickly. “It stands for Time and Relative Dimensions in Space. This is a time machine. Anywhere you want to go, any point in history or in the future, it’s just a few levers and buttons away.”

So that’s how he got here. “Are you from the future?” she blurted.

“Mmm, not exactly.” He ran up to the central console, darting around it as he flicked switches and pressed buttons. “I’m a Time Lord, from the planet Gallifrey, and we are one pull of a lever away from being in space and meeting Sally Ride. So, what do you say?”

Sarah could say no. She could leave the box, choose not to run off with a self-proclaimed alien that she’d just met, she could go back to the house and sleep, or she could take the opportunity that stood before and around her, beckoning her agreement. The Doctor wasn’t going to hurt her; something about him struck her as the sheer opposite of violent and dangerous. There was a certain warmth and sincerity that he radiated, one that couldn’t be faked, and she knew all about people faking warmth and kindness.

The Doctor’s hand hovered over the lever, a bright eagerness in his eyes as he waited for her response.

A grin spread its way over her face. “Yes.” She’d actually just said that, just agreed to goodness knows what. “Yes. OK, let’s go!”

With one fluid motion, the Doctor slammed the lever down, and the TARDIS around them shuddered momentarily, making that same strange noise it did when it first appeared. Sarah gripped onto the edge of the console, as she would have fallen over otherwise, and in a second’s time, the room was still once more. She was still struggling to understand what had just happened, and the Doctor was already making his way to the front door, walking in long strides, looking a bit confused when she didn’t follow.

“Well come on, what are you waiting for?”

“Didn’t we just come in through that door? Out there...it’s just the yard…”

“Are you sure? Why don’t you come and see for yourself? I can promise you we are _not_ in your front yard anymore.”

Her hands let go of the TARDIS console, and she hurried to join the Doctor at the door.

“I give you, the _Challenger_ , June 1983, _in space_!” He announced the words with a flourish, and opened the TARDIS door.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here you are, at the end of the first chapter! 
> 
> This rewrite is a project I've been wanting to do for years now. I started writing about Sarah back in 2014, on a different account on a different website, but due to things getting in the way, her adventures were never fully fleshed out, until now! What you have just read is only the first of many chapters to come, revisiting two characters that, honestly, are very near and dear to my heart.
> 
> Way back in 2014, Sarah was born from imagination and darkness. She was essentially a self insert I used to escape things in life that were hard to deal with, and I can say without any shame that writing silly self insert Doctor Who fanfiction was one of the things that kept me going in those years, and brought me to where I am today. When I think back to her story, what had been written of it, much of it was woven with sadness and depression, and I feel that it can be more than that. At its core, it is a story about growth, working through that and becoming a better, more hopeful, more optimistic person, despite the things that the world throws in your face. I want to retell her story, this time with more joy and light, and with more of her growing and healing from her experiences, becoming the happy adventurer that she was always meant to be.
> 
> When I started getting into Doctor Who in the first place, I wasn't who I am today, but the Doctor was the sort of person I aspired to be like. There is a quote of his, one which found its place next to my name and picture in my yearbook, that sums it up perfectly. "I am and always will be the optimist, the hoper of far-flung hopes and the dreamer of improbable dreams." That was the sort of person I wanted to be, the sort of perspective I wanted to have on the world. It's been a while, but I can happily say I am more or less there. I might not be flying around the universe in a TARDIS, but I'm not cowering in fear of the world around me. No matter the goal or dream, I follow it relentlessly instead of constantly second-guessing myself and setting it aside. I'd like to think that, in the case that the Doctor is real, that he'd be proud of me. I have no way of knowing for certain whether or not he helped me get to where I am, but I do know that writing these stories played their part.
> 
> Anyhow, there's a personal little ramble. This story means a lot to me. In a sense, it's a part of me, and it's finally being told again, happier and in more completion.


	2. Sarah Ride, Meet Sally Ride

It was so strange, one moment gravity was as resilient as ever within the TARDIS, and the next, it had simply disappeared. As Sarah stepped over the threshold of the time machine, she found herself swimming in midair, in an unoccupied room of blinking lights and oxygen regulators. She was grateful for her decision to wear leggings when she left the house; pulling a Marilyn Monroe every other moment would be inconvenient.

The area around them was small and cramped, as was to be expected from a 1980’s shuttle, and the TARDIS just _barely_ fit within the confining space, the light at its top mere centimetres away from grazing the ceiling. Unlike Sarah, the Doctor seemed very accustomed to the lack of gravity. He had already moved outside, gripping a handle-like apparatus on the side of one wall while his tweed jacket billowed out rather unceremoniously around him.

Within seconds, he picked up on Sarah’s uncertainty, and extended an arm to her. “Here, take my hand,” offered the Doctor. “You’ll get used to zero gravity soon enough.”

Part of her wanted to protest, thinking she could learn and adapt on her own, but Sarah quickly dismissed the thought, taking up the offer. The Doctor gently pulled her through the air until she was able to reach a handhold of her own, which she used to maneuver herself to the door frame at the other end of the room. The walls themselves were lined with early Space Age technology, mostly monotonous gray in color, many of which appeared to have one or more important uses. While Sarah moved gingerly around them, uncertain of what would happen if she disturbed anything, the Doctor was perfectly at ease in this setting. It was as if he already knew each of the instruments’ functions, which ones to avoid, and which ones wouldn’t cause any harm. 

Outside of the smaller chamber was the main area, more technological kibble covering nearly all of its surfaces save for the front windows and seating. The expedition’s crew, about eleven members, floated about in there, backs turned to the strangers as they engaged in lively conversation. Despite having reached the final frontier and being so far from home, they were quite relaxed, that is, until someone turned around. 

“What’s the matter, John?” said one of the men, going silent when he followed his line of sight, as did the rest of the crew. They stared, open-mouthed, for a few seconds, before the man who had just spoken moved forward.

He seemed afraid, a fear that was quite plausible given the circumstances. As far as this man had been concerned, he and his crew were the only individuals aboard the _Challenger_ , and there was no possible way that someone else could have gotten on. There wasn’t even supposed to be anyone else in space, and yet here they were, two odd strangers on the shuttle, calm as could be. 

“Who are you?” asked the man, his face betraying fear and incredulity. “How did you even get here?” His voice was steady, but there was a slight yet discernible shake in his hands.

Without missing a single beat, the Doctor pulled something out of his jacket — a small black booklet with a single, blank card inside — and showed the man. “I’m the Doctor, and this is my friend Sarah. We’re just dropping by, just a normal, er...routine sort of thing. Making sure the flight is going well and all. No problems with the shuttle or anything, I’m guessing?”

“No, none at all. Oh, er, I’m Robert, by the way. Robert Crippen, commander.” He paused for a moment, thinking. “Mission Control never told us about you, though. They should have, _would_ have told us…” Robert stopped himself in the middle of his sentence, dismissing whatever it was that he was about to say next, almost as if he didn’t know what to say next.

A woman, the only female member of the crew, moved forward to join Robert. She had a mass of curly hair and a face that Sarah recognized almost immediately; this was definitely Sally Ride. 

“He says they’re here for some sort of flight check-in,” explained Robert, though the tone of his voice betrayed his doubt. “I’m still trying to figure out how they got on board in the first place. We didn’t pick up any airlock disturbances or anything. He...the, uh Doctor, he’s got all the right credentials. Definitely isn’t American, though; he’s got an English accent.”

“That’s right, Robert, definitely not American. I won’t bore you with the details, but my friend here, she’s always wanted to meet Sally. Thinks she might be a future relative and all.”

Sally’s face twisted in confusion. “Future relative? What?”

“We’re time travellers,” Sarah piped up. “I’m from 2016, and he’s from...I don’t know. We sort of just met, really. Please don’t worry, we’re not here to cause any harm.” 

Behind the four of them, the rest of the crew were huddled together, talking quietly amongst themselves and cautiously glancing at Sarah and the Doctor. 

“My name is Sarah,” she continued. “Sarah Ride. I’m eighteen years old and I’m from Canada. We have the same last name, and it’s always been something I’ve wondered, if I might be related to the first American woman in space.”

Sally was absolutely baffled. “I...I don’t think I have any family in Canada right now,” she stammered. “I don’t have any children either, so your guess is as good as mine, really.” There was a brief moment of silence between the pair, a singular beat where there was no sound but the ambience of the shuttle and the conversation behind them, before Sarah and Sally simultaneously burst into laughter. 

“You’re a time traveller! I don’t believe this! That’s crazy, time travel isn’t real, but you’re right here and we’re talking!”

Sarah shrugged, as much as one could shrug in zero gravity. “I’m still processing all of this too, believe it or not. This guy here…” She gestured to the Doctor. “...He’s got all the real time travel-ey answers in that box of his.”

“Erm, Robert, is it?” inquired the Doctor. “You’re not placing any of this into the ship’s log, are you?”

“I hadn’t even thought of that until now, why?”

“If I were you, I wouldn’t bother.” Robert was absolutely shocked at the Doctor’s words, but nevertheless let the strange man continue speaking. “Trust me here, it’s a bit too early for that sort of thing, and if anything your time as an astronaut may be discontinued. I know a bit of the eighties, and NASA isn’t going to believe it.”

“But the historical implications!” sputtered the astronaut. “The research that could be forwarded—”

“Without any hard evidence, it won’t go far, I’m afraid.” He put a hand on the man’s left shoulder. “I know all of this is absurd to all of you, but I need you to trust me on this one thing. Can you do that, Robert?”

“To anyone else, I would say no,” he responded. “But something about you tells me I should; a gut feeling, I guess.” Rather shakily, Robert’s right hand rose to his forehead in a salute. “You have my trust, sir.”

The Doctor nodded respectfully at Robert. “Good man,” he said. “Trust me, you’ll be thankful later.”

Meanwhile, Sarah and Sally were chatting excitedly to one another, the topic of their conversation seeming to focus mostly upon timelines, asking about one another’s time and whatnot. Being an astronaut herself, Sally was curious to see how technology had advanced in the way of space travel, and what new achievements were made.

“And what about the Wow! Signal?” she inquired of the young woman. “Has that one been solved yet? Has humankind…” Sally lowered her voice so that she was out of earshot of her fellow crew members. “Have we made _contact_ yet?”

Sarah giggled quietly, smiling to herself. In Sally’s time, extraterrestrial life was something more so limited to forty-cent comic books and isolated conspiracy theorists, not certified NASA members. “As sad as it is, that one is a no, none that the government is letting on. Except for the Doctor anyway.” Just as the words left her mouth, a thought came to mind, a sudden realization, and she gasped. “That must make me the first!”

“The first? I don’t understand...wait. _The Doctor?_ But he looks human!”

“He’s from another planet, he says. Starts with a ‘G’; I can’t remember it. I’ll have to ask him again.”

Sally appeared doubtful. “Just because he said that, you believe him?” she asked. “I’m not trying to judge you, but I’m a woman of science and evidence.”

The question caught her by surprise. Sarah hadn’t considered evidence of him actually being an alien; the TARDIS was evidence enough with its impossible dimensions and capabilities. “His time machine, it’s not from here,” replied Sarah. “There’s no way it’s built by humans, it’s bigger on the inside! I guess when you put that into perspective, an alien that looks like one of us is nothing.”

“That’s a lot to take in,” Sally admitted. Sarah could visibly see her processing it all, behind the confident, professional demeanor she wore. “Sometimes the only choice is to believe, I suppose.”

“Did I hear someone talking about my TARDIS?” asked the Doctor suddenly, moving over behind Sarah. He glanced between the two of them, a bit skeptical. “Better not be anything bad, she’s got a bit of a temper.”

Sarah’s face scrunched up, confused. “The TARDIS?”

“Yes, who else do you think I was talking about, Sally here? Yes, the TARDIS is a bit finicky, so be nice to her.” The Doctor was silly yet stern about it, wagging a finger and all. 

From the front of the shuttle came a signaling, beeping sort of sound, almost as if a Space Age telephone was ringing. 

“Oh, that’s Mission Control,” said Robert offhandedly. “Checking in with us, same as usual.”

“In that case,” responded the Doctor. “We’d best be taking our leave. Don’t want to tamper with the timeline or anything.” 

Sarah picked up on his words, quickly following suit. “It was nice to meet you, Sally. Good luck with your future travels!”

“And to you and the Doctor as well!” said Sally with a smile.

The two of them waved goodbye then began navigating their way to the back, where the TARDIS waited. Just as they were out of sight from the main area, the communication line crackled to life, and a voice could be heard from the other end, checking in with the crew.

“Sometimes it’s best to leave a timeline be,” commented the Doctor as he finally reached the TARDIS door. “Especially in the case of America, they’re so —”

“Hostile?” Sarah volunteered.

“Yes! Exactly! You’ve got Reagan, the Cold War, all that nonsense, it wouldn’t take much to stir it up and change the course of time. And, especially when you’re dealing with something as massive as NASA, when space travel is just beginning? I’d say it’s a point best left alone.” He gave a little curtsy toward the TARDIS, gesturing for her to enter first. 

Switching from zero gravity to normal gravity was, once again, a bizarre thing for Sarah. Her arms grabbed a bit awkwardly at the side of the time machine’s exterior, grasping for a handhold, and she found that she stood as normal again as soon as she made physical contact with the thing. The Doctor opened the front door rather gingerly and stepped inside, leaving the entrance ajar for Sarah to follow suit.

She wasn’t the most knowledgeable about American history, but knew enough to take the Doctor’s advice without hesitation. Pivotal and sensitive points in time were best left alone; any misstep could bring about a nation-wide conflict, and that was _not_ something Sarah wanted to start. His words swam about in her mind as she entered the time machine, pondering the idea of alternate timelines as she closed the TARDIS door behind her. 

The Doctor had already started towards the console, but rather than setting the TARDIS toward another destination, he turned around to face Sarah.

“So, what did you think?” He clasped his hands together, eyes bright with enthusiasm as he awaited a response. “2016 to 1983 in the blink of an eye, Sally Ride, _space_? How was it?”

Sarah wasn’t sure exactly how to reply. How did one even rate a trip through time; it wasn’t like giving feedback for a vacation or hotel service. She laughed awkwardly, a hand messing through her hair, and she leaned one arm on one of the TARDIS railings. “Unbelievable? Incredible? I’m still kind of wondering if this is all a dream, but it’s a bit too real.”

“Ah yes, makes sense. Everyone adapts differently after all, though you seem to be picking up faster than most. No screaming or stuttering or anything; that happens more than you might think.”

 _Screaming?_ “Why, do you keep scary alien stuff in here or something?” 

The Doctor smirked, amused by her comment. “Oh, no. Well...maybe? Depends what you consider scary. No, it’s the ones who are firmly set on what should and shouldn’t be. Engineers and such, the people who really know the laws of physics. Boggles their minds a bit.” He turned back to the console, fiddling with some of the instruments there. “I’m assuming you’ll want to go back home now.” The sentence was spoken as a statement, though it came out as a question as well. 

“No!” Sarah blurted. The word came out so fast, her face immediately reddening with embarrassment. Why didn’t she just wait and say it better, it sounded so pathetic and desperate then and there, but it was the truth. After seeing what was out there, even the smallest bit of it, the last thing she wanted to do was go back home, to that house, to her family, to her empty existence there. “Please, don’t take me back.”

The Doctor’s back straightened and he spun around to face her once more. He wore an expression that was difficult to decipher; a pinch of concern quickly outshadowed by his normal cheery attitude. Sarah could tell, he’d picked up on it, on that tiny something, but was polite enough not to pry. “I knew it,” he smirked.

“What?” Sarah was thoroughly taken aback. “What do you mean, you knew it? Knew what?”

“You have a certain sense for adventure. You’re curious, going inside a box that appeared near your home in the middle of the night, agreeing to travel through time with someone you just met. You’ve got the qualities of an adventurer, that’s for certain, and there’s so much more this TARDIS can do than go to the 80’s.”

“The 80’s in _space_ ,” she added. 

“My point exactly! Now, where to next?”

“Well, we’re already in space,” mused Sarah. “How about another planet?” She ran up to the console to join him, though her hands kept a safe distance from its innumerable pieces. “You say you’re an alien, so we both know those exist. There’s gotta be more of them, all different kinds. Let’s go see what there is!”


	3. Arcadian Winters and Unanswered Questions

This was something that would take some getting used to; one flick of a switch and they were somewhere else entirely. Sarah remembered from the previous time to hold onto something the moment the TARDIS took off. She watched, holding laughter back, as the Doctor didn’t do that so well. He would have fallen onto the intricate glass floor if it weren’t for the many handholds on the console. They were put there for a reason, she figured. Did he put them there, or did they just come with these handholds, manufactured onto it as commonplace as a horn is manufactured onto a steering wheel?  
  
At last, seconds later, the machine around them halted its shaking distortion. Once he could easily stand upright, the Doctor activated one of the screens on the console, an old thing suspended next to the main glass column. He twisted a dial on its side and an image flickered to life, one she had difficulty seeing from where she stood.  
  
“Good choice on the winter jacket,” remarked the Doctor. “The TARDIS is picking up some colder temperatures outside; must be winter here.”  
  
“Call it a gut instinct,” Sarah said with a shrug. She zipped her coat up all the way in preparation for the waiting climate. “Didn’t seem sensible to go out into the yard in just pajamas. Some people do that, go out in their pajamas. I don’t get it.” She rolled her eyes, then gestured to the door behind her. “Is it safe out there?”  
  
“Of _course_ it’s safe,” the Doctor assured. The words came out almost as a laugh, like he’d just been asked an absurd question. He flicked the display screen off, spun on his heel, and joined Sarah in front of the door. “Do you want to open it this time?”  
  
She grinned, feeling a warm jump of excitement in her stomach. Sarah’s fingers closed around the metal handle of the TARDIS door, holding her breath when she pulled it open.  
  
Sarah wasn’t sure what she thought she’d see on the other side, and found herself pleasantly surprised by what was there. Instead of a chrome-plated world teeming with little green men and bizarre animals, this planet was more familiar, almost close to home. The ground was hewn into cobblestone streets, puddles of melted snow in places as more tumbled from the sky. Around them, houses at least three storeys tall stood, made from wood and stone, holding warm light within. She could see figures behind the glass of the windows, moving about inside their homes and living their lives.  
  
One hand still gripped the door handle as Sarah leaned out into this new world, eyes wide with wonder. This was another planet. They were on another planet, on a planet that wasn’t Earth! Her gaze turned upward, meeting unfamiliar stars strewn across the sky in constellations she didn’t yet know. Two moons hung there as well, one a bit larger than its sibling, its craters just barely visible to the naked eye.  
  
“Do they all look like this?” she asked. “Different planets, I mean. So familiar, so much like what you’re used to?”  
  
“No, not all of them.” The Doctor stood behind her, hands folded neatly behind his back as he gazed upward as well. “Depends on what you’re used to. To you, this is like Earth, but to another species it’s strange and different.”  
  
“I guess so, yeah. This place, what’s it called?”  
  
“This,” said the Doctor, sweeping one arm wide across the town before them. “This is Arcadia, humble capital of the planet Corandrus.”  
  
“It’s so quiet, though. Aren’t capital cities typically bigger, busier? You know, skyscrapers, cars, the hustle and bustle of it all?”  
  
His head tilted to one side, just a tiny bit, and he laughed. “Didn’t you hear me? _Humble_ capital. Besides, those are Earth standards. Here on Corandrus, a capital is more determined by its historical significance.” The Doctor leaned against one side of the TARDIS door frame. “Arcadia was the first settled town, a historical cornerstone to the exploration of the planet! Besides, there aren’t cars here. Totally different timeline, different technology.”  
  
He hopped out of the blue box and onto the cobblestone street. “Just take a sniff of that air, not even a hint of fossil fuel combustion! Isn’t it refreshing?” As if to demonstrate, he took a lungful of it, almost comical as he did so.  
  
Sarah stepped out after him and took a deep breath as well. At first, she didn’t notice it. It wasn’t every day she went around smelling the air after all, but there was something _cleaner_ about the atmosphere that she had difficulty placing. It was like when she went outside the city, out to the country, and there was something different about it. Chimney smoke and the smell of animals replaced the stink of chemical exhaust and urban sprawl.  
  
“Huh, it really _is_ different. It’s one of those things you never really think about, I guess.”  
  
“Of course, it’s always the small things that make a world of difference.” The Doctor held an open hand out to her in invitation. “Come along now, there’s so much to see!”  
  
She hesitated — he was still so much of a stranger to her — but took his hand regardless. Strange, the Doctor’s skin was a bit colder than hers. He probably had a lower internal body temperature; he _was_ an alien, after all.  
  
They walked down quiet streets, closed doors and shuttered windows, their warmth betraying the apparent lack of life within. Smaller streets led to larger ones, humble houses giving way to more public buildings like shops and schools, and Sarah couldn’t help but notice the trail of candles that was beginning to form. Many of them had long since burned out, becoming nothing but sad piles of wax and useless wicks, but a few burned on still.  
  
“Hey, uh, what’s with these candles here?” Sarah asked. “Is it some kind of a cultural thing?”  
  
As she’d spoken those words the Doctor let go of Sarah’s hand, wandering off to one candle trail and leaning down to get a closer look. He produced a strange object from his pocket and began to scan the candles, examining them with the green light from the object. “Eh, they’re fairly normal, as far as I can tell.” The object made a sort of electrical warbling sound, then clicked, and he checked it again. “Yep, just ordinary candles. It’s strange though, they weren’t here before and I’m pretty sure it’s not a Corandrusian tradition or anything. Not one I can remember.”  
  
Sarah watched from a short distance, trying to make sense of it. Improbable as it was, since this was a completely alien planet, she still had the feeling something was off. “When were you last here?” she asked the Doctor.  
  
He sprang to his feet. “Winter festival, around oh, ten, fifteen years back? Time gets all mixed up when you’re a time traveler, when you’re not moving chronologically. Instead of a line going forward, you’re going back and forth, up and down, all around…” The Doctor gestured about with his hands as he spoke; something he seemed to do a lot. “But yes, winter festivals in Arcadia, biggest celebration of the year. Lovely things, eating and dancing and music like you’ve never heard before. No candles though, at least not like this.”  
  
“Maybe they lead to something,” said Sarah. “They keep going, all the way down this street and onward.” She started along, following the trail, but did so with caution. For all Sarah knew, danger could be just around the corner, and it was best to be careful.  
  
Following the path of candles, the two made their way to the town hall, seemingly towering above the rest of Arcadia with its gray stone structure and the clockwork at its top. The candles gathered here, more than on the streets, clustered messily about the town hall’s steps. Once again, the Doctor took the strange object from his pocket, scanning the area around them with it, coming to a stop as it was pointed at the town hall. The electrical warbling was different than before, more erratic, and he followed it up the front steps, the device held out before him like it was a dowsing rod and he was hunting for a hidden well.  
  
“What _is_ that?” Sarah asked, pointing to the device.  
  
The Doctor tossed the device into the air, like it was for show, and caught it immediately. “Sonic screwdriver,” he said. “One of the best tools in the universe, reliable Gallifreyan technology.”  
  
There it was again, that word. _Gallifrey._ “That’s where you’re from, right? You mentioned it before, said it was a planet?”  
  
His face darkened for a moment before resuming its usual brightness. “Yes, that’s correct. Home of the Time Lords, the shining capital of—” The Doctor stopped speaking all of the sudden, noticing the rapid beeping from the device in his hand. They were in front of the town hall’s doors, massive and hewn from carved wood. “That’s strange, for the era of this city, there shouldn’t be any readings like this. They’re much too high, too advanced.”  
  
“What do you mean?”  
  
“I mean it’s _wrong_. Not meant to be.” Without a moment’s hesitation, the Doctor pushed one of the wooden doors open, the loud creak echoing through the silence and emptiness of the hall. The only light came from numerous candles and the Doctor’s sonic screwdriver, illuminating a large, almost churchlike interior. Tables and chairs were arranged in neat rows, all turned to face the center of the room. Unlike the rest of the town hall, this central area was slightly elevated, surrounded by a mass of lit candles, and in an old wooden chair on the elevated area of the room sat a stooped figure.  
  
The figure was small and thin, clad in clothes many sizes too large. Its eyes were hazy, sunken into sockets of yellowed skin that appeared to be pulled tight over bones. When the door opened, the figure looked up, pulling itself into a more upright position.  
  
“Another has come to the Questioner,” it croaked, voice aged and decidedly masculine. “Answer my question and regain your freedom, or return to your petty living.”  
  
Sarah’s eyebrows knotted together in confusion. “Who’s this?” she whispered to the Doctor, who seemed just as puzzled.  
  
“The Questioner, I suppose, but I’ve never heard of him before—”  
  
“Enter, girl!” commanded the Questioner, cutting the Doctor off before he could finish his sentence. “Answer my question and regain your freedom, or return to your petty living.”  
  
There he went, repeating the exact same thing as before. Whatever his question was, Sarah didn’t want to answer. Something about this situation felt wrong somehow, but regardless, Sarah stepped forward.  
  
“We’re not citizens here,” she said, thankful that her voice didn’t reflect her own uncertainty. “We’re just passing through—”  
  
“We’re historians,” the Doctor quickly added. “Traveling the planet, studying different forms of architecture for our…thesis paper.” He put an arm around Sarah, giving her a brief nod, as if to say that he had the situation managed. “History students, from the province of Wravostad.”  
  
“There is nothing to see here for your history,” muttered the Questioner. Unlike the Doctor, his body remained almost entirely still when he spoke, save for the subtle movements of a withered mouth. “Answer my question and regain your freedom, or return to your petty living.”  
  
“Oh, but there’s plenty for history!” said the Doctor. “Arcadia is the capital city after all, and its culture is a fascination of mine. It’s so beautiful here, though the candles on the streets were a bit unexpected, I must say. Is there a reason for them? We’re not from here; like I said, here on a study.”  
  
“Answer my question, _Doctor_.” The Questioner was more demanding this time, and something about his tone made the Doctor step back.  
  
“What question...wait. I never told you my name,” he said. His voice raised up a notch, louder and less like its normal, soft tone. “How do you know my name?”  
  
In an instant, the entire atmosphere of the room changed. It wasn’t a change of temperature, but rather of the situation. Sarah had only known the Doctor for an hour or so, just a short while, but in that time he was always calm and bright, never once raising his voice. There was an old anger in it now, with a pinch of fear, and at that moment the unsettling feel of Arcadia started to make sense.  
  
Her eyes wandered about the inside of the town hall, looking every which way for something, some answer to the cold feeling in the pit of her stomach. Chilling uncertainty finally gave way to fear when her gaze turned upward.  
  
She didn’t scream, didn’t know if she could. Fear paralyzed her, her jaw slack as she stared at that _thing_ and it watched her in return. As she kept eye contact with it, not even daring to blink, her hand reached out blindly for the Doctor, fingers brushing the tweed of his jacket sleeve. “Doctor,” she muttered, gently gripping the fabric. “Look.”  
  
There was a second, a split second of silence, then his hand found its way into Sarah’s. Bony fingers wrapped around her own, holding on tight.  
  
The thing in the rafters noticed.  
  
“I need you to trust me,” whispered the Doctor. “Do you trust me, Sarah?”  
  
It wasn’t like she had much of a choice. “Yes. I trust you.”  
  
“When I say so, we’re going to run.” The two of them watched it, waiting for any movement or indication, and when the Doctor said “run”, she didn’t hesitate. There was a slight tug on her wrist as he pulled her along, boots thunking on the hardwood floor, and within seconds she matched his pace. They tore toward the still-open door, passing through it just as Sarah heard something heavy fall to the floor behind them. She could hear it scrambling across the wood, but they were already outside in the snow and fresh air, down the street and past candles when a heavy door slammed shut behind them.  
  
They were a safe distance from the town hall when the Doctor finally slowed down, coming to a stop. Sarah did as well, leaning against the brick of a building, winded. She wasn’t very athletic; sports weren’t exactly her thing, and as such didn’t run very often. As for the Doctor, he seemed mostly unfazed, like this was something he did all the time.  
  
“What _was_ that?” Sarah said, still puffing a bit. His answer wasn’t what she expected at all.  
  
“I don’t know.”  
  
Part of her expected him to know. He was, after all, the Doctor, the alien with the time machine. It made sense that he might have the answers, or at least be more familiar with this sort of thing, but he wasn’t. He was just as unsure as she was, still adjusting to it all just like her.  
  
Sarah was still trying to formulate some sort of answer, something in reply, when the door next to her opened. She jumped back, surprised and a bit embarrassed. This _was_ someone’s house after all, and she’d been caught carelessly leaning on it.  
  
“I’m sorry,” she stammered. “There’s something in the town hall, and we were running…”  
  
The person behind the door didn’t appear to be the least bit bothered. It looked like a normal human being; two arms, two legs, a torso, and a head, but the skin was different. From the nose all the way to the hairline, furrows likely defined by bone structure rose from the skull, indented similarly to those on some lizards. Their skin was the color of sand at low tide, speckled about with spots but smooth as Sarah’s own, contrasted by long, dark hair that was pulled behind their head, and they wore simple, practical clothes.  
  
“Come inside,” urged the stranger, a voice that seemed neither male nor female. “It isn’t safe.”  
  
Sarah looked to the Doctor, concerned. “They’re a stranger. A stranger is inviting us into their house. This doesn’t seem right.”  
  
“Why should we listen to you?” the Doctor asked.  
  
“Because the streets aren’t for us,” replied the strange person. “You look like you have seen it too.Do you know what it is capable of?”  
  
The Doctor was silent for a moment, letting the words sink in before he turned to Sarah. “They're right, you know,” he said. “I trust them.”  
  
“If you trust them, then so do I.” There was a bravery in her voice that she hadn’t expected. They were entering a stranger’s house on an alien planet, and because the Doctor trusted them she barely hesitated.  
  
The alien stranger stepped aside, gesturing for them to enter. It was warm inside, Sarah could smell food cooking and a fireplace burning behind the door, and with a nod from the Doctor, she stepped inside.  
  
“Oh, by the way, my name is Montressoure,” said the alien.  
  
Sarah stopped, one boot still on the threshold, and smiled up at the alien. “Thank you, Montressoure. My name is Sarah, and this is the Doctor.”  
  
Montressoure’s eyes lit up at the sound of the Doctor’s name. “The _Doctor_? You don’t say! Well, come on in, I’ll get you both something warm to drink.”


	4. Liberation of the Corandrusian Capital

Quickly ushering them inside, Montressoure made to lock the door behind them, taking the time with the many locks and latches that kept them from the strange, warped city. There had to be at least five, Sarah noticed, before the interior caught her attention.  
  
Everything about this house exuded warmth, from the smell of food cooking in another room, to the crackling fireplace in the front parlor. There were children; two of them on the floor and the third on a leather sofa, the pair playing a sort of game near the fireplace, and the other reclining with a book. Still a bit disoriented, Sarah looked for a place to put her shoes. She didn’t want to track snow and dirt from the streets into this lovely home.  
  
There was a tap on her shoulder, and she turned around to face the Doctor. “Right there,” he said, motioning to a section of the hardwood floor, where an arrangement of shoes and boots alike rested. The Doctor had already added his own boots to the pile, and made to follow Montressoure in his mismatched socks. She smiled as she noticed that, but didn’t say anything about it. Rather, she unlaced her own boots, setting them neatly next to his, and followed Montressoure and the Doctor into the kitchen.  
  
Part of her felt surprised that she was being included all of this, rather than being ushered off to sit with the children while the adults spoke in hushed whispers about things they didn’t think she was mature enough to handle. That’s what would have happened back home, anyway, even though she was eighteen now, _technically_ an adult. This wasn’t back home, though; far from it. Things were different here, what she had to say mattered here, and that thought brought a pinch of confidence to her as Sarah entered the kitchen.  
  
Montressoure was fiddling about with a kettle, filling it with water from a tap-like spigot while speaking with the Doctor. Despite the frightening nature of the story the time traveller told, their face betrayed very little in the way of fear, almost as if it was common for those things to happen here.  
  
“Do you need a hand with anything?” Sarah piped up.  
  
“Oh?” Montressoure seemed surprised, as if offering assistance was uncommon here. “Of course! If you don’t mind, could you watch the kettle while I gather the tea?” They opened a cupboard in one corner of the kitchen, picking and choosing ingredients with a skilled speed that could easily be mistaken for random choice. “It’s locally grown, you know. All the herbs, they’re from the city’s market, blended together right here.”  
  
“That’s lovely,” commented the Doctor. “Have you ever compared local produce to the store-bought stuff?” he asked Sarah. “It’s so much better.”  
  
The kettle, hot to the touch, began to whistle in its place above the stovetop’s small flame. Montressoure placed the ingredients into a teapot, an earthenware sort of thing from another cupboard, and offered to let Sarah pour the hot water inside. A warm, homey smell wafted up and out as the tea began to steep, and as it did so, Montressoure produced a tray from another cupboard, stacked with matching earthenware cups. They placed the teapot onto the tray along with the cups, and carried it out to the front parlor, where it was set upon the table in the middle of the room.  
  
Montressoure sat down on the leather sofa and began to pour hot drinks for everyone in the room. The child reading closed her book, took a cup of tea, and moved to a side chair, making room for the guests. With a smile and a nod of thanks, the Doctor took a seat, Sarah settling onto the upholstery beside him.  
  
“I never thought I would actually meet you,” noted Montressoure, methodically pouring tea into the other earthenware cups. “None of us did; it’s been so long since you were last here.”  
  
“Mother is right,” said one of the children on the floor, gratefully taking the warm drink offered to them. “Everyone has heard the stories, the stranger who ended the rule of Nakehema Hema and gave Arcadia back to the people.”  
  
_Oh, Montressoure is a she._ Would it have been rude to ask? Sarah wasn’t sure, but it didn’t seem worthwhile anyhow. Her thoughts were interrupted by the Doctor handing her a cup of tea, which she took with both hands. She rested back against the comfortable leather of the sofa, waiting for the drink to cool down a bit. “How long ago was that?”  
  
“Seventy years,” answered Montressoure.  
  
“Seventy? I was _sure_ it wasn’t that long, something like ten or fifteen at most,” the Doctor laughed, gently nudging Sarah with one elbow. “You tend to lose track sometimes when you’re travelling through time.”  
  
“Right. Onto more pressing matters, if I may.” Montressoure set the teapot and tray onto the table in front of them, then continued. “This Questioner, he has been here for years now. No one is certain exactly when all of this started, but it was at least a decade after you left. The mayor, of course, was the first to investigate, but he never left the town hall since. We think that… thing in there is using him, like a puppet or a mouthpiece, and he has essentially become the Questioner. I have seen him myself; he hasn’t moved from that chair for years now, just wasting away. Some think the thing is trying to take over the position of mayor, but how it’s even succeeding, no one is sure.”  
  
“Psychic energy, maybe?” suggested the Doctor.  
  
“That’s one option, yes. If there’s anyone who can help us, Doctor, it’s you.”  
  
Sarah took a drink of her tea, relaxing into the couch and listening to the exchange between Montressoure and the Doctor. She was starting to feel a bit drowsy, especially after her lack of sleep and all this running around. Given a safe house and a warm drink, her subconscious was telling her it was all right to sit back and sleep. Just a little nap, really. A nap would be fine; these people were kind, they’d let them into their house, and even if they turned out to be malicious, the Doctor was right there. He wouldn’t let anything happen to her.  
  
She set the cup in her lap after one more sip and closed her eyes. The heat of the fireplace warmed her legs and relaxed her mind. Beside her, the Doctor and Montressoure were speaking to one another, going on about the Questioner, and Sarah allowed their conversation to become peaceful background noise, lulling her off to sleep.  
  
At some point after nodding off, she woke up again, in a hazy, half-awake state of being. She’d moved in her sleep, her head now resting on the Doctor’s shoulder. He must have noticed at some point, for his arm was wrapped around her shoulder, holding her as she slept. He carried on still with Montressoure, both of their voices lowered respectfully, and for a small moment, Sarah had the urge to scurry to the other side of the couch, worried that she was invading his personal space. But that wasn’t how it was, not at all.  
  
The Doctor didn’t seem to mind at all, and neither did she. There was never anything of this sort back home, she wasn’t used to being kept safe, but stayed where she was nonetheless. This was different, this wasn’t home and the people there, and something about that changed things. Something about being away from home, with this brilliant and strange alien instead of a family that watched and judged her every move, something about that was just _better_ somehow. Made her feel okayer.  
  
The next morning, she woke on the sofa, well rested and ready for the day. One of the children brought her a blanket at some point in the night — she vaguely remembered that happening — which she’d gratefully wrapped around herself. She’d curled up on one end of the couch, the armrest doubling as a pillow of sorts, while the Doctor was sprawled out ungracefully, one leg touching the floor, mouth open in a silent snore. Sarah sat herself up, trying not to laugh lest she wake him. There were sounds coming from the kitchen; breakfast was cooking, and soon Montressoure and another alien of the same species brought them each a tray of food.  
  
“Good morning,” said the other alien. “We haven’t yet met, but I heard about yourself and the Doctor from Montressoure. I am Petel, Montressoure’s partner.”  
  
“He was off working last night,” explained Montressoure. “Few places are open late, the tavern being one of them.” She chuckled, giving her partner a fond smile. “Come now, Sarah, have something to eat.” Sarah gently shook the Doctor’s shoulder and his eyes blinked open, as one does when woken from a deep sleep.  
  
The breakfast served by Montressoure and Petel wasn’t what Sarah was used to, but what would she even expect from another planet? It consisted of a multigrain bread like a small baguette, an assortment of colorful fruits diced together in a bowl like fruit salad, and two steaming mugs of what smelled like coffee.  
  
“Thank you,” said the Doctor, taking the tray offered to him, as did Sarah.  
  
“You are most welcome,” replied Montressoure with a smile. “We will now leave the two of you to eat, and if you need anything at all, please do not hesitate to ask.” The pair then left them, returning hand-in-hand to the kitchen.  
  
One of the first things Sarah noticed was that the bread was served plain, no butter or jam or anything on the side. She briefly considered asking for something to add to it, but quickly banished the idea away. Montressoure and Petel had been so kind and hospitable, letting them stay the night and bringing them meals, and it would be borderline rude to ask for jam, right? _That must be how it’s served here,_ she figured. The last thing she wanted to do was potentially insult their culture and hospitality, so she brushed the thoughts away and took a first bite of the bread.  
  
The moment she tasted the baked loaf, Sarah immediately understood why there was no jam or butter; there was no need for it. Though hard and crispened on the outside, the middle was baked soft and fluffy, with a sweetness to it she couldn’t quite place. There was no doubt that this had been homemade, for nothing manufactured time and time again could come out this good.  
  
“What did I miss last night?” Sarah asked. “Right before I passed out, anyway.”  
  
The Doctor had chosen the bowl of fruit first, his expression unreadable as he ate. “Mostly just history, catching up on what happened after I was last here, people’s different experiences with the Questioner, and...oh! Those candles you were asking about, those are there for a reason too.”  
  
While the two of them polished off their breakfast, the Doctor shared all that had been discussed while Sarah slept. All of the candles, she learned, were left in the street by those who had not answered the Questioner, which was the entire population of Arcadia. It was like keeping an alternative sort of tally count, if one could not answer the Questioner, they left a candle out in the street. From his work at the tavern, Petel had heard many different stories from Arcadia’s citizens, most of which agreeing that the thing in the town hall was somehow getting into their minds, asking questions it wouldn’t have otherwise known. For the most part, the questions were either something the victim did not know the answer to, or something they refused to answer.  
  
“For example,” he said between mouthfuls. “Say you’ve got this big secret, something you can never tell anyone else, not _ever_ , or… you’re not very good at math, and then someone asks you a question about calculus. You have no idea what the answer is, right?”  
  
Sarah snorted. She was terrible at math; when it came to linear equations and triangles, her brain just couldn’t make sense of it. “You got that right.”  
  
“The thing in the hall, we think it uses a psychic connection to the Questioner, and likewise the Questioner to anyone he speaks to.”  
  
“But psychic things, aren’t they, you know?” Sarah wiggled her fingers about dramatically. “Superstition and stuff?”  
  
Without a second thought, the Doctor withdrew a familiar-looking black booklet from his coat pocket. “Remember this?”  
  
“Yeah, from yesterday… sorta yesterday?” Time travel was still confusing, maybe it would make sense later on in the future. “When we were with Sally Ride.”  
  
“It’s _psychic_ paper. Not really that superstitious when you get it down to a science. Several parts of the universe have already figured that out, but not Earth for the most part. Your fields of study tend to stray from any topic deemed superstitious and supernatural, so psychic science doesn’t exist there. Not _yet_ , anyway.”  
  
“Huh.” Sarah took a sip of her drink — it was definitely some kind of coffee — stopping when she noticed an odd look from her new friend. “What?”  
  
He laughed. “That’s not how you… here, the bread is dipped into the coffee first, and once it’s gone you drink the rest. Don’t feel bad, though, I did the same thing on my first time here. They won’t be offended or anything.”  
  
Curious, Sarah tried it. The harder outside of the bread softened a bit as it soaked the coffee, and surprisingly, the inside of the bread didn’t immediately turn soggy. While it wasn’t the type of thing she wouldn’t eat often, it wasn’t necessarily bad either.  
  
After breakfast, the two of them thanked Montressoure and her family, before bidding them farewell and setting out once more onto the streets of Arcadia. It was morning now, the two moons hidden in the atmosphere and one brilliant sun shining behind wispy white clouds.  
  
“I have a plan,” said the Doctor. “It seems that all who have been questioned, they never thought to question back. No one knows what happens when you question back, and we’re about to find out today.”  
  
“Kinda surprised no one thought of that yet,” Sarah mused.  
  
“Not so, when given the perspective.” Even while walking, his hands moved about as he spoke. “Fear does things to the mind, cuts out logic and brings out the fight or flight response.”  
  
“That makes sense.” She thought on it for a moment as they walked down the candle-littered streets, retracing their steps back to the town hall. “What are you going to ask?”  
  
“A riddle, but not just _any_ riddle, no. I’m going to ask him a riddle in an old, forgotten language that I know he cannot speak or answer. It hasn’t been spoken in almost a thousand years; no one knows it.”  
  
Sarah wanted to ask what that language was, but something about the way the Doctor said it kept her silent, and they walked to the town hall. There was a somber tone to his voice, perhaps this forgotten language was something to him that he didn’t want to speak of, just like something the Questioner would ask. A chill crept its way up her spine as she remembered what lurked inside, that old man and...the other thing, but she tried not to think about it too much. She was with the Doctor and the Doctor had a plan.  
  
Despite having little range of motion, the Questioner looked up when they returned to his chamber in the town hall, a visible disbelief in his sunken eyes. He tried to move forward in his seat, but was incapable of doing so. Cold air blew around them, the draft of the still-open door chilling the room. Just in case things didn’t work, just in case if they had to run, they didn’t close the door.  
  
“You have returned, Doctor,” he said, voice thin like a feeble gasp for air. “Answer my question and regain your freedom, or return to your petty living.”  
  
The Doctor held the sonic screwdriver in one hand, the other hanging free and empty at his side. “Funny you say that, because I actually have a question for you. You seem to be a fan of those.” With no reply from the Questioner, the Doctor stepped forward to the chair where he sat decaying. Sarah stood where she was, watching from a safe distance. She had no intent of physically getting caught up in anything that might be dangerous.  
  
She watched, willing herself not to look up, as the Doctor leaned down to the Questioner and whispered something in his ear. She couldn’t hear it, but saw the shock in the old man.  
  
“How do you speak that,” he whispered, just barely audible in the empty silence of the hall. “Gallifreyan is an old, dead language; it hasn’t been spoken in a thousand years.”  
  
“Don’t you have an answer to my riddle?” There was a playful snark in his voice, but before he could utter another word, something massive and heavy crashed to the floor, knocking the Doctor onto the ground, his sonic screwdriver skittering across the hardwood floor from his hand.  
  
The thing in the rafters stood on the ground before them, a coordinated mass of gray skin pulled taut over bones, organs and tissue, tottering about on three spindly legs with strange, fingerlike toes. A spine climbed its back, vertebrae poking through paper-thin skin as a mountain range protrudes from an otherwise flat horizon. Rather than ending with a skull or a head, the vertebrae simply ended, coming to a stop before a stump of skin and muscle, outward from which hovered an eerie white mask. It towered over all of them, at least twice their height, belittling the Doctor as he scrambled backward to get away from it.  
  
“You speak the language of the Time Lords,” rasped the Questioner, still in his seat as the thing advanced upon the Doctor. It was a puppet, psychically connected, just like they’d talked about earlier. The thing, it didn’t have a mouth or anything, all its words were communicated through this old man. “How do you speak the language of the Time Lords?”  
  
For a few seconds, Sarah was frozen in shock, nothing but an onlooker in all of this. That thing was massive and terrifying, the stuff of nightmares, and it was somehow _real_ , standing right there in front of them. She felt she had to do something, help in some way, but how could she even help? What could she even do? This creature was massive, and Sarah was only human. And that’s when she finally noticed the sonic screwdriver, the one he’d dropped, and ran for it.  
  
All of this happened in the span of mere moments, but it felt like hours in her frightened mind. She bolted across the room, hoping the creature and the Questioner wouldn’t react fast enough, grabbed at the alien technology on the floor, and stood between the thing and the Doctor, the sonic screwdriver pointed directly at the hovering mask that comprised its face.  
  
Sarah’s hands and voice shook, a mix of fear and adrenaline coursing through her veins, but she held her ground, eyes locked with the black holes of the creature’s mask. “Step away from him,” Sarah stammered. She wanted to sound strong and brave, but her voice didn’t exactly comply. “I...I don’t know how this works, but let me tell you, you lay one hand on the Doctor, and I _will_ use it against you..” She fumbled about, looking for a button or a switch or something, and ended up activating one of its functions. The sonic warble she’d heard a few times already sang out from the device, and Sarah waved it at the creature, as if that might somehow intimidate it.  
  
Behind her, the Doctor stood up, scuffling to his feet rather clumsily. “Sarah, what are you doing?”  
  
She didn’t know, she just acted on impulse, and her impulse was to protect the Doctor, just as he had kept her safe. “I didn’t want you to get hurt.”  
  
The Doctor started to speak, but was cut off by another voice.  
  
“Weak human,” muttered the Questioner, and the thing took a step closer. “Wasting your time with things you do not understand.”  
  
Sarah flicked her wrist, throwing the sonic screwdriver out like she’d seen the Doctor do before and the bit on the end sprung open like some sort of metal alien flower. A different, high-pitched warble screamed out from the device in her hand, and the creature jumped back as if stung by it. Its mask spat sparks into the air, the Questioner collapsed in his seat, and Sarah dropped the screwdriver, clamping her hands over her ears to block out the sharp sound.  
  
Immediately, the Doctor snatched the sonic screwdriver up from the floor where it had fallen, shutting the sound off with a practiced ease. He gave Sarah a brief glance, a nod and a smile, as if to reassure her, before approaching the creature before them. It looked somehow wrong with its mask suspended in place but broken, essentially rendering it powerless.  
  
“Would you look at that? Pure chance, one press of a button, and that mask of yours is useless. You can’t control anyone without it, can you? Without your mask, you’re just like the rest of us.”  
  
The creature could not speak. It didn’t have a mouth to do so; it spoke only through others, and with its mask broken, it was essentially mute. There was a moment, a small break, as it took the Doctor’s words in, before fleeing out the open door in a sort of wavy, lopsided gallop. They watched it tear down one street, before taking a turn down another and becoming obscured from their line of view.  
  
“It’s a good thing most people are still at home right now,” the Doctor commented. “I imagine it won’t hurt anyone that way.”  
  
“Where’s it going?”  
  
“Anywhere it can hide, or more likely, wherever it came from. We may never know, but maybe that’s for the best.”  
  
Sarah gestured to the corpse in the chair. “What about the Questioner?” said Sarah. “Do we just… do we leave him here?”  
  
“He deserves a proper Corandrusian funeral, just as he would have had if he’d passed on his own. That creature, it was keeping him on the brink of death, keeping him from dying just so it could use him as a puppet. He’s finally at peace now, and deserves respect.”  
  
“But the whole town, all of Arcadia, he kept them prisoner!”  
  
“That wasn’t him. He wasn’t even the Questioner, he was the mayor. He didn’t do any of this willingly. It could have been anyone, could have been you or me.”  
  
She couldn’t imagine what that could be like, living under the complete control of someone else, having them choose her every step, her every word, warping who she was and inciting fear in everyone she knew. It must have been horrible for the mayor, and with that understanding, she felt terribly sorry for him. She hoped that in death, he had finally gotten his peace from living through that.  
  
The next week in Arcadia consisted almost entirely of reviving the town, reconstructing anything that had fallen into disrepair and ensuring that each and every one of those candles was cleared away. First and foremost, though, a funeral was held for the mayor, one attended by all of the town. Even after everything, the citizens still respected him as their leader, and left mementos of all sorts upon his grave in his honor, from flowers to letters to even children’s toys. In his honor, they would wait a bit before electing a new mayor, but would schedule the winter festival earlier than normal to celebrate Sarah and the Doctor freeing them.  
  
Of course, they stayed for a bit, doing their part to help revitalize the capital. When that was complete, they contributed to the winter festival preparations as well, stringing garlands through fences and lamp-posts, assembling small concession stands for food and things. Montressoure and Petel let them stay at their home during that time, providing hot meals, changes of clean clothes, and a roof to sleep beneath.  
  
When all of the preparations were complete at last, it was time for the festivities. The townspeople came together as a committee, acting in place of the late mayor, to decide the specifics of the festival; small details such as the type of live music to be played, or the duration of the event itself.  
_Maybe they’ll keep that up, instead of electing another mayor_ , thought Sarah. From what she had seen, they worked very well together. She was certain that it was a form of government, where the people decide together rather than a single individual. She’d heard that somewhere, wasn’t sure though, as she wasn’t much of an expert on politics.  
  
The festival was properly set up and began around six o’clock in the evening, just after supper, and even those working night hours were excused so they could enjoy the fun with their families. It warmed Sarah’s heart to see Petel at home with Montressoure and the family, the children chattering about excitedly as they donned colorful, patterned festival wear. Montressoure offered one of her old festival dresses to Sarah, a yellow and beige hand-stitched garment, and as kind as the offer was, it did not fit.  
  
Gas lights gleamed from their homes atop lamp posts, painting the town a soft orange among the snow and cobblestone, and as Sarah and the Doctor exited the house where they had stayed for the past week, they could hear music playing in the distance. It had been arranged that the festival would be held in the town square, as it was one of Arcadia’s largest open spaces. Citizens milled about the area, some clustered around food and drink stands, talking with one another. The air smelled like winter in that sort of way that is hard to describe, like chimney smoke and pine needles and caramel. Children ran free from their parents, chasing each other in games, while others danced to the live music that played. The music felt folkish and yet upbeat; a medley of the piano, accordion, guitar, the hurdy-gurdy, and a variety of brass instruments, all taking their turns to complement each other’s sounds in a way that brought them together in a cozy symphony.  
  
Heads turned when Sarah and the Doctor passed, delighted citizens (and some a bit drunk) shaking their hands and thanking them for all they’d done. Vendors did not charge them for food or drink, handing out sweet breads and warm cups of cider to “the champions of Arcadia”, as they called them. Some approached the pair, asking if they would stay in town, though the Doctor had to decline.  
  
“We’re just travellers,” he explained. “Just passing through, helping out as we can.”  
  
They understood, albeit a bit disappointed.  
  
At one point in the night, a circle of children near the bandstand dragged Sarah and the Doctor in to dance with them. There weren’t as many adults dancing and Sarah felt a little awkward at first, but when she saw the Doctor go in without any hesitation, she quickly got over whatever was holding her back and followed suit. They danced in circles and in pairs, some of the braver children approaching the Doctor and asking to be spun in circles, something that appeared to be an agreed favorite. Much to the delight of the musicians, more adults joined in the fun, some dancing with their children and some dancing with one another.  
  
By no means was the Doctor a good dancer; he was rather clumsy on his feet, almost like an uncoordinated giraffe. Sarah wasn’t much good either, but neither was her time-travelling friend, and that didn’t stop him, so it shouldn’t stop her either. It wasn’t being good that mattered — not here, anyway — it was having a good time and enjoying oneself, and that was exactly what she meant to do. At one song — a jaunty sort of tavern song — she asked the Doctor to dance with her, a request to which he obliged with a warm smile.  
  
She took his hand, bony fingers wrapping around her own, and off they went, moving circles across the cobblestone and snow. What type of dance it was, she wasn’t certain; perhaps it had no name. They turned and spun, joined at the wrist, laughing like carefree children. Sarah took glimpses every so often of the others in the town square, noticing their movements and adapting them to her own, all the while trying not to accidentally step on the Doctor’s feet.  
  
The townspeople had gathered around them, clapping in time to the music. They stepped a bit forward, moved backward a bit, and every so often the Doctor spun her around, the black fabric of her dress fanning around her in a spiral. As the song concluded, they finished the dance with a final twirl and a small curtsy at one another, citizens applauding.  
  
It wasn’t until late that night, when the festival was winding down, that Sarah and the Doctor finally returned to the TARDIS. They bid their hosts a brief farewell, thanking them again for everything, and headed down the street to the corner where the blue box rested. The door creaked when the Doctor opened it, and the pair stepped inside.  
  
Sarah unzipped her coat, leaning against one of the interior railings with a yawn. The night had been a long one; lots of moving about and talking to people, and she would have been lying if she said she wasn’t at least a little tired.  
  
“A bit worn out, are we?”  
  
She looked up. “Yeah, just a bit. Time sorta flies by when you’re having fun, and you don’t notice when it gets late.”  
  
“If you like, the TARDIS has plenty of guest rooms,” offered the Doctor. “King sized beds, closets of cozy pajamas, fancy bathrooms with hot tubs in them, the works. Since it seems like you’ll be sticking around awhile, why don’t you take one of them?”  
  
A luxury bedroom sounded heavenly right then, even more so that it was inside a time machine that was also a spaceship. Strange as that whole situation was, Sarah was getting used to it quickly enough. She rubbed her drooping eyes and stretched.  
  
“I think that sounds great,” she said. “Whereabouts are the guest rooms?”  
  
The Doctor began to point down one of the hallways leading out of the console room, then offered an arm to his tired companion. “Come on, I’ll show you!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, over a month later and here we are.
> 
> Corona and everything being closed sorta cuts down on the inspiration to write, I find. Usually I'll go to the library with a coffee and my laptop to write, but now things are just sorta this mundane cycle of work, sleep, eat, day off work, etc. That's why it's taken so long.
> 
> I got so attached to Montressoure and her family, though, when writing this one. They might be one-time characters but I still love them so much. 
> 
> Here's some art of the thing in the rafters: https://keeg-draws-stuff.tumblr.com/post/618298220547899392/the-thing-in-the-rafters
> 
> Thank you so much to my beta reader and wonderful friend @shyjjtn.


	5. A Quiet Day in the TARDIS

The halls of the TARDIS were like a maze, twisting and turning in unexpected directions, in directions that confused Sarah a bit. She’d started to get more used to the whole bigger on the inside thing, trying not to think too much about the time machine’s interior defying the laws of nature, but it was full of surprises still. For example, it was sentient. How exactly, she wasn’t sure, but the TARDIS was very much alive, according to the Doctor. It didn’t speak like they did, but certainly had a mind of its own.  
  
“She’ll find you a nice room,” assured the Doctor, leading her down one hall. Around them, a low whirring could be heard, the Doctor chuckling in response. “This one,” he said, pointing to a door, one carved and finished with nice wood, standing out in contrast to the more standard metal doors they’d passed.  
  
“How do you know?”  
  
“She told me.” He said it so effortlessly, as if there was nothing strange about a massive time machine speaking to him.  
  
Sarah turned the handle, the door opening into a large room lit in the same soft orange light as the TARDIS control room, only more muted. In the center of the room lay a massive, queen-sized bed, decked out with a myriad of plush pillows and thick bedding, and lights like paper lanterns hung scattered on the ceiling above.  
  
“Do you just have a bunch of rooms like this?” she asked. “All fancy like and whatnot?”  
  
The Doctor was taken aback by her question. “Well, of _course_ I do! Guests and visitors, travelling companions, they stay for awhile, where are they supposed to sleep? The console room?”  
  
“I mean, that chair you have in there _does_ look pretty comfortable,” Sarah admitted with a shrug. “But right now, just about any place I can rest looks comfortable.”  
  
There was a brief pause, and the two of them laughed.  
  
“Thank you,” she said. “Really, Doctor. I appreciate it.”  
  
“You’re welcome. I’ll be off now, leave you to sleep. If you need anything, the console room is just down the hall.” And, with saying that and a wave of the hand, the Time Lord took his leave, sauntering down the TARDIS halls, out of eyesight of the young traveller.  
  
She closed the door, undressed, and searched the massive wardrobe for sleepwear, settling on a simple two piece pajama set. The material was pale blue with white stripes and light, though the TARDIS was warm and the bed filled with plenty of blankets.  
  
She was about to settle into the bed and take on her way to dreamland, the switch was conveniently placed at the bedside, when she happened to glance at the ceiling, and was glad she did so. The entirety of it was painted with a massive star map; stars she didn’t even recognize, unfamiliar constellations, and in the place of suns for these unknown solar systems were ceiling lamps, some large and some small, but so many that they lit the room the same as a normal ceiling lamp would.  
  
“It’s beautiful, thank you.” She’d seen the Doctor talking to the TARDIS before, and although she never heard it speak back, she had no doubt that it was indeed alive. It had chosen this room for her, after all.  
  
There were no spoken words of reply, but the room around her made a sort of whirring sound, like that of a relaxed machine, similarly to a car engine on idle. Sarah clambered into bed, laying upon the nest of pillows and blankets, all of which smelled fresh as if they’d just been washed that day. _I wonder what kind of laundry detergent he uses,_ she wondered idly. It smelled like fresh air and something else, something strange and alien and friendly.  
  
She pulled one particularly fluffy blanket up to her chin and closed her eyes.  
  
That night, Sarah slept soundly, woken not by sunlight or loud noises but by the smell of something good cooking and the faint strains of music. She got up and out of bed, dressing with clothes from the wardrobe — a cable-knit sweater and some jeans that fit just right — and left the bedroom. The sounds and smells guided her through the halls, leading to an open kitchen door.  
  
It wasn’t a typical, run-of-the-mill kitchen, nothing like the one in her home. No, it was oddly shaped, cupboards and drawers towering to the ceiling, some of them only accessible by ladder, a six-burner stove with bizarre-looking burners and a round stove part that was bulbous like the body of a woodstove. On one burner sat a pan, sausages sizzling away, and on the counter among dustings of flour sat a kettle, water boiling happily within. The Doctor stood at a counter at the other end of the kitchen, his back to Sarah, wearing a bright orange welding gown. There was a bit of flour in his hair, and his attention was focused on a bowl he was whisking. He turned around when he heard her enter, his expression lighting up.  
  
“Come on in!” he called out from the other side of the kitchen, waving her over with a free arm. “Breakfast is almost ready!”  
  
Sarah smirked, stifling a giggle. “I think you’ve got something in your hair.”  
  
The Doctor’s barely-there eyebrows furrowed together, before he huffed. It didn’t bother him.  
  
“What’s with the welding getup?”  
  
“Couldn’t find an apron,” he said with a shrug.  
  
She helped him finish cooking, and they ate breakfast in the kitchen, leaning against a cleaner section of the counter since there was no dining area. Sarah chatted away about how nicely she had slept for her first night in an alien spaceship, about the lovely light mural on the ceiling, and how accommodating the TARDIS had been with everything. When she asked the Doctor how such a haphazard-looking cooking process could turn out tasting like gourmet, he shared his experience on the planet Ergenstadt, of the culinary masters he'd learned from in his time there.  
  
“Of course they're some of the finest, they have _four_ arms after all. So much more you can do with an extra set, amateur or expert.”  
  
The two of them finished eating, and did the dishes together afterward. Sarah was leaning against the counter, drying a pan off with a dish towel when the Doctor spoke up.  
  
“Where would you like to go next?”  
  
For a moment or two, Sarah wasn’t sure what to say. She was standing in a time machine with — as far as she knew — limitless travel capabilities next to an eccentric alien, able to go anywhere and anytime in the whole universe, and couldn’t think of an interesting destination. It was like when someone asked her what her favorite movie was and suddenly she forgot each one she’d ever seen. But then, the answer came to her, nearly impossible to be missed.  
  
“The TARDIS,” she said finally. “All those doors we passed last night, how far do the halls go? How many rooms? It’s bigger on the inside, sure, but _how much bigger_?”  
  
“So we’re looking for the grand tour, are we? That one’s a bit uncommon, most people usually want to see the Stone Age or the end of the universe—” The Doctor caught himself mid-sentence, quickly halting the rambling. “Right, yes, the TARDIS. Well then, er, I suppose we should start with the console room, or the front door? Not outside, though, that wouldn’t end well. We’re sort of in space after all.”  
  
And so they started with the console room, the Doctor throwing the front doors open wide, gesturing to the expanse of stars and nebulae that lay before them. While she stared out, taking it all in, he ducked under the main control board, quickly grabbing the trusty fez that he tucked away for special occasions. Sarah cocked an eyebrow, gesturing to his choice of headgear, but with a very convincing tone, the Doctor explained to her just how cool fezzes were, and how important they were to any tour guide, no matter where they were.  
  
He gave a brief summary of where in space they were, which galaxy, and a bit of history on its formation before moving on. When he got to the console, though, Sarah found the Doctor stuttered a bit about its origins, where it was built and engineered, but did not veer further when he skipped over some of the details. She’d noticed in the short time they’d been traveling together that he preferred not to talk of his home and people, and while she was definitely curious about that, Sarah respected his choices and did not pry any further. If and when he ever chose to speak up about those things, he would choose the time, not her.  
  
Rather than its origins, the Doctor focused more on the TARDIS’s capabilities, what some of the tools on its dash were used for, a brief summary of how it worked. Sarah hardly understood, but she was still fascinated nonetheless, and listened intently.  
  
They moved along their way, the Doctor taking particular interest in the library/swimming pool as they passed it. “Personal favorite,” he commented. “First one I visited in this regeneration, actually. Fell right in there.” It was a massive library, bookshelves forming a maze of sorts that twisted and turned in whimsical paths, and in its very center was an enormous swimming pool, lit from beneath the water. Oddly enough, the smell of chlorine wasn’t as strong as she’d expected; it did not drown out the scent of old pages but rather coexisted with it. The ceiling reached far above them, curving upwards like the interior of a cathedral with skylight windows, outside of which shone the stars of a night sky far from home. Being rather fond of libraries, Sarah made a mental note to return in the future for a read and a swim.  
  
On they went, stopping at the observatory with its massive golden telescope, the generator room with its metal grated floors and steam-spitting pipes, the TARDIS wardrobe with its spindly spiral stairs and rows of racks of clothes, and even a storage room that looked like it hadn’t been cleaned in ages. They passed through chamber after chamber, some mundane as could be and others structured with bizarre alien technology that Sarah was in no way familiar with. It fascinated her and boggled her mind.  
  
A few hours had passed exploring, and she decided in the end that she wanted to see more of the swimming pool/library. She didn’t really think she’d need the Doctor showing her the way, as she remembered which door led to her destination; the door was only a frame after all. The TARDIS halls twisted and turned in all sorts of odd ways as she traversed them, but within a few minutes or so, she smelled the all-familiar scent of chlorine, and followed it.  
  
The chamber itself was absolutely enormous, a labyrinth of shelves and books, and the only sound coming from her footfalls and the sound of the water splashing against the edge of the pool. Upon a closer inspection, Sarah noticed how this library didn't follow the typical organizational system, nor were the books in shambles. She was quite fond of libraries, hoping one day to work as a librarian, so she knew her stuff when it came to the Dewey decimal system. Whatever method the Doctor used to categorize his library, it wasn't one Sarah was familiar with, so rather than trying to find a specific section, she wandered the shelves, looking for anything that might pique her interest.  
  
His categorization system confused her, biographies mixed in with poetry and atlases, languages of all sorts thrown together on the shelves. Sarah couldn't imagine how he found anything he was looking for, until she started looking inside covers and it made sense in an ironic sort of way. The Doctor organized chronologically. There were no signs on shelves to indicate this, but being a very old and very intelligent alien, she figured he didn't need them. As she perused the shelves, taking this information in, she suddenly knew exactly what she was looking for.  
  
Farther back, the shelves got dustier and bindings became rolled parchments and even some stone tablets (which were safely held in glass display cases). She wasn't sure of the exact time, but the old feel of the etchings said something about when their contents were written. Sarah withdrew a roll of parchment, handling the rather stiff material with the utmost care, and eased it open.  
  
The TARDIS must have had some sort of translation function installed, Sarah figured, when she found that she could read the ancient Greek and Egyptian text as if it were English. She still couldn't believe it; she was holding an artifact from the library of Alexandria and could easily understand what it said. One of history's greatest losses, and part of it shared a library with some first edition Agatha Christie mysteries and translucent digital datapads.  
  
From what she could tell, it was a script for a play, something like the ancient Greek tragedies she had to study for one of her English classes, like Oedipus and Antigone. Sarah carefully took it over to one of the seats in the library and began to read, poring over the perfectly preserved text. In a rather short amount of time, she finished it, returned it to its place and continued to peruse.  
  
A couple of hours later found Sarah sitting in the open TARDIS doorway, a blanket draped over her shoulders, legs hanging out of the frame and into space, eyes drifting over one of Da Vinci’s notebooks. She didn’t exactly understand all of his coded writing, but regardless found herself marvelling at his intricate sketches and diagrams of anatomy, inventions and imagination. All was silent around her, save for the ambient hum of the console, beeping and whirring in the background. Sarah didn’t even notice the Doctor until he sat down next to her, offering a steaming cup of hot chocolate.  
  
“Da Vinci, huh?”  
  
Sarah closed the book, taking the warm mug with a smile. “Thank you, Doctor. And yes, I still can’t believe you have an original copy.”  
  
The Doctor sat down behind her, legs crossed and leaning forward just a bit out into space. “Well you know,” he said. “ _Time machine_.”  
  
“What was he like?” asked Sarah.  
  
“Mmm, interesting for sure. Brilliant mind, very imaginative, very gay.” He said that matter-of-factly, without a hint of discrimination. “Flirted with me a bit, actually. Couldn’t mess with the stream of time though, you know how that tends to go. Wasn’t really my type anyway.”  
  
“Yeah, like in movies where you step on a butterfly and suddenly Hitler won World War II...or something like that. I getcha.” She sat back a bit, book in her lap, propping herself up with her arms. “That’s just an everyday thing for you, though? Just bopping around time and space, that’s what you do, that’s how you live?”  
  
“Pretty much.”  
  
“No responsibilities, no being tied down to a house and a city, and if you make a mistake, you can just go back and fix it. That sounds great.”  
  
“Well,” interrupted the Doctor. “It’s not _exactly_ like that. I do have responsibilities, and you can’t exactly just go back in time for the little things. A bit more complicated than that, but...essentially yes.”  
  
She hummed in reply, not really saying much but there wasn’t a whole lot to be said. They just sort of sat there, sipping their hot chocolate in peaceful silence and enjoying the view of the galaxies that lay outside the door.


End file.
